Description: Her location scoped out by Kula and Angel, Shurui calls K' to touch base with him once the NESTS agents have left. The two discuss Kula, Kula's little 'gift' to Shurui, and the current situation. K' arrived fresh off Southsynd work for Geese, however; and though he certainly doesn't tell her that, Shurui is quick to get suspicious about what he gets up to in his spare time.
The door shuts with a slam as Shurui comes in to her dorm room, only to collapse a few moments later into the embrace of her secondhand comforter and futon. And, for fifteen minutes, she doesn't do much else, simply giving her mind the space it needs to breathe. ".... To call or not to call...." Digging into her pockets for her phone, Shurui rolls over on her back, eventually fishing out....
.... A tiny plastic penguin. Milton. ".... Better not show you to K'; dunno what he'd think if he knew who you were." Then, dangling it over her face, she furrows her eyes at her quiet charge, adding, "You better not have a microphone or tracking device placed in you. Or I'll be *really* pissed." .... Milton, as always, keeps his comments to himself, dangling mutely. "Kula might not've thought to do that, but that Angel woman probably would. What an asshole! Riding off my concern as just some sort of emoness. For fuck's sake, there's a different between being all 'oh woe is me' and being *realistic*. I wasn't telling her that the world was bad; just that I'd have to fight her!" Sighing as she looks up at Milton, Shurui then ushers the plastic penguin back into the safe confines of her pocket, feeling somewhat better.
You know, Kula has a point. Sometimes talking aloud to inanimate objects *can* be a viable stress reliever.Now, where's her phone again? Ah!
K''s phone soon rings, baring the vague text message, "Call me A S A pee." Looks like her phone's still not all that smart when it comes to translating her words into speech.
The deal of the other night had gone off, largely without a hitch, due in part to K''s own efforts in thwarting attempts to disrupt it... and now that the supply line was firmly established, it was just a matter of selling the goods. Tonight was just followup-- the 'boring part,' as K' had long ago mentally labeled it-- which mostly entailed tagging along as the Syndicate made its rounds, stopping in at the nightclubs of Southtown before they really got going for the night and stocking them up with enough designer drugs to knock out even the Saturday evening crowds.
Activity fell off around 9 PM, and K' decided to take off and finally get an evening to himself. GHB hadn't been the only thing coming in as a result of that deal, and he'd managed to make off with a couple packs of really... -nice-... cigarettes. He usually didn't bother indulging in anything so decadent it needed the label 'luxury,' finding the pretentious airs surrounding it all quite laughable; but it was free, and once in a while he -should- get a little something nice for all the shit he had to d--
Something vibrates against his hip. Speaking of shit he's got to deal with.
Frowning around that first cigarette, K' pulls his cell out of his jeans pocket and narrows his eyes at the display. One sharp, sighed breath later, he starts off in a swift walk. He's already close enough to Gedo, and it won't take him long to get there. En route, he flips the phone open, hits speed dial, and waits for the girl to pick up; momentarily trapping the small device against his shoulder so he can free his right hand to light up.
The first thing he says when she -does- pick up is-- as always-- charming and articulate: "What."
You can't say Shurui's been calling K' without a good reason. Then again, it may be *because* of that that her calls may not be the best recieved.
"Agents came to the school to confirm I was there," is the first thing Shurui says after K''s moody greeting. Then, just as quickly, "Don't worry, they're gone. It was Kula and a woman named Angel. They weren't there to fight. I got *some* information for my trouble, though Kula didn't seem to know when they were coming to get me." Already, her mind is going through the possible things K' may say in response. Things like 'why didn't you tell me?!' or.... well 'why didn't you tell me?!'
Her idea of how K' behaves can be limited at times. Shurui's no oracle.
Whether K' asks or not, she's already speaking. "I didn't call you because I didn't want to scare them off immediately. I was in the courtyard and everyone's pretty aware someone's been trying to get me. If they tried anything, it would have been a disaster due to them being outnumbered. Besides, Kula was..." She frowns. ".... She's got no notion of what the outside world is like. She was more interested in being my friend than anything, and Angel was just nuts in general."
A pause. "I forgot to ask you the last time, but... did you find that one girl? Whip? .... I felt really bad, springing that on you out of nowhere."
Silence, save for the regular, steady exhales of a smoker. Unexpectedly, K' just... lets Shurui talk, right on through to the finish. Maybe the smoking is calming him just enough to spare Shurui the bulk of the more characteristic irritation that she expects from him. The smoke certainly -does- taste a lot better than what he usually pulls down his roughened throat.
"They weren't there to fight -yet-," he eventually corrects her, his voice rasping over the line with some bleak amusement. "And honestly... given the shit NESTS has got up to lately, attacking schools outright, I'm surprised they weren't. Even if you -were- in the middle of a fuckin courtyard."
Like a shadow, K' invites himself right onto Gedo's grounds, avoiding notice with relative ease. He approaches Shurui's dorm the conventional way this time, taking pains not to be seen; though the caution is barely even warranted, given it's late enough that it's not hard to go totally unnoticed. Shurui talks about Kula's disposition and K' just grunts a noncommittal sort of "Mmn," not really seeming to want to talk about his antitype. Not over the phone, anyway. And Whip?
"...I'll tell you that in person," comes the gruff reply. "Open the door."
"... Right. They're going to come back, sooner rather than later," Shurui agrees, pausing to slightly nudge the shades of her window to one side to peek through.
Well, if he *was* out there, it wouldn't surprise her.
Sighing as she listens empathically to K''s grumbling, she mumbles back, "Tell me about it. Not only are they going around all the schools causing trouble, they've been supposedly dropping *my* name all over the place while doing it. The last thing any of us need is someone thinking there's something 'interesting' about any of us. Wasn't there some weird shit that happened with the schools a few years ago? Some of those weirdos could still be around. Also with Kula around, it's pretty clear they want you too."
As for Whip? Shurui blinks as she realizes that, in fact, K' is already here. Opening the door, phone in hand, Shurui collapses the phone in one hand, moving to the side to let the taller young man through. "... Guess you were close by. That was quick." Closing the door behind her, she heads for the fridge, opening it to fish for a pitcher of lemonade for herself. "I don't have much, but... you thirsty? Got some pop too."
K' shoulders in the instant the door's opened for him, moving with the assertive and confident obnoxiousness of a cat. Stepping past the shorter girl and immediately making a quick, prowling circuit of the dorm for any signs of untoward presences or spying, K' brings in with him the strong scent of cigarette smoke, leather, boy, and... something sweeter, which Shurui might or might not recognize as the stench of marijuana. Not something K' himself enjoyed at all... but he's been forced to endure the company of people who did for a couple hours now.
Geese and his 'tasks' might almost have been a bad influence on K', if he hadn't already been exposed to all this long ago during his periodic missions for NESTS as an agent.
A simple shake of the head answers Shurui's hospitality. "Just water. Didn't get too much sleep last night, got a fuck of a headache." The boy settles himself by the window, cracking it wide open and finishing off his cigarette there. See, he can be mildly considerate.
"They always wanted me." A shoulder lifts in a shrug, as K' exhales a cloud of smoke out through the window screen. "From what I can tell, they -made- that girl, a year or two ago, just to bring me back. Or just to kill me, I dunno." A smoky sort of chuckle escapes his throat, the sound more bleak than amused. "Glad they think I'm dangerous enough as a traitor to bother, but... I didn't ask them to mess up another life just cause of me."
And as for Whip... K' suddenly gets strangely reticent. His jaw draws taut, lashes lowering over suddenly-wary eyes. "Yeah I found her. Stopped her from getting herself killed. Things are fine." For now, anyway. He's not really saying as much as he could about her; Whip is the one person K' treasures most. But ... he does owe her discovery to Shurui, and it's because of that fact that he slowly adds, "You were right."
Shurui's nose begins to itch as K' saunters past her like an overgrown alley cat. Sure, the leather, K' smell, and cigarette smoke is something that's always there; she at least notices the cigarettes don't seem as noxious as usual. Then, there's something sweeter, something like-
Oh boy, does Shurui ever recongize that smell. Marijuana is one of the many things she was exposed to during her first year; it's a wonder she didn't give in and get past the infant stage of inhaling. She almost opens her mouth to speak, but, when K' mentions his headache, she shrugs it off. As much as she'd *like* to nag the guy and find out, Shurui knows better than to push Happy Fun K' when he has a headache. Better to save the fun for when his temper is... a little more flexible. Besides, if he doesn't already know the information she's going to tell him? His headache may get worse.
Taking out generic branded water bottle, she twists the top slightly, and, with a casual "Catch," as a head's up, she throws it lightly to K'. ".... Got some tea too, if you think that'll do the trick." Call it an old habit from her days with Muda, but Shurui actually never has minded being the casual hostess, for all her moody complaints.
"Her energy matches yours," Shurui then says, pouring a glass of lemonade for herself. "You could say it's like it's 'inverted', though. The exact opposite and the same at the same time." Pausing to drink the sour liquid and then wincing at the bite of it as it passes over her tongue, Shurui then adds, "I watched the SNF match. It's... not the same as watching a match in person, though, for me. But I caught enough by the dialouge to eventually figure out who she was. It's not the same as Whip, though; that's a bond that something else altogether. Like, something hardwired, rather than just two things being similiar, I guess. I dunno."
Silence floods in as the topic changes over to that of Whip; Shurui nods slowly as K''s quiet words hang in the air, seeming just as hesitant to say anything. She remembers that small earthquake of a meltdown K' had over the phone: intense, compact, and over before she even had a chance to figure out what she could say back. But really, could there ever be, without her sounding all trite and false? ".... I'm glad," she finally says. "Things like that don't happen that much."
Snaring the thrown bottle out of the air, K' shakes his head mutely as he opens it. He's not in a tea mood. Leaving the opened bottle on the windowsill a minute, he finishes off his cigarette, crushing the embers against the palm of his metal-gloved hand. He holds his silence throughout. Were Shurui to nag him about where he's been and what he's been doing, it's doubtful he would even reply appreciably; much less reveal to her that it's all because he signed up with a man called Geese Howard...
That'll be his secret, for the time being. Neither Shurui OR Whip has to know. He doesn't care to get -them- ensnared in Howard's machinations, too.
The comments about Kula's energy he could have guessed for himself. K' says nothing. Instead, he just pulls up the window screen a little bit: just enough he can discard what's left of the cigarette. Sure it's littering, but he doesn't really want to leave it lying around in here stinking up the place, either. "What else did you find out?" he eventually asks, not looking at her. He's got that Kula is some kind of friendly childlike weirdo. He's got that she and Angel were here to scope out the place: and to scope out Shurui.
And it's clear he's thinking on what to do about it. "I don't know what to tell you," he's eventually forced to admit. "I've only got one solution." It would be so easy, he thinks dispassionately, to just not care. To take off on my own, watch my own back, and preserve myself. Besides, who's to say what will happen to Shurui when she goes back? K' knows he himself will probably be either mindwiped or simply put down, but what of her? Why should he care whether she goes back or not?
His headache gets worse. Especially when the topic goes back to Whip. Palming the side of his head briefly, fingers eventually shifting to push through his prematurely white hair, K' starts going through his pockets looking for aspirin. Probably why he wanted the water in the first place. "Things like what..." He's not on top of the thinking game right now; he's too stressed. He feels too boxed in. And somewhere in the back of his mind, he's wondering when he let himself feel so tied down.
It's probably a good thing Shurui doesn't know about K''s.... other secret. Or Whip, for that matter. While the marijuana smoke could be held suspect at a later time, for now, it's easily pushed aside in favor of more pressing matters. Like, for instance, her safety and that of K''s. While this could be thought of as something touching or sentimental, it's also something practical in Shurui's mind: K' is more powerful than her. If he's badly injured or taken by NESTS, she'll have to stand for herself. Sure, people like the Guardian Kings can help, but how far does she want them to go for her? She can't have them defending her at every turn, but she can't be a one-girl army either. Not now. What can she do now? Make sure K' doesn't leave here worse for wear. For both their sakes.
As for Kula? "... She has the mindset of a kid. It's a double-edged sword; NESTS can keep her in the dark for longer because she isn't skeptical, but she's just as likely to be curious. She couldn't understand why'd you left." Shurui pauses, strategically running her eyes along the Beast of Fire's visual aura to note her next action. "I told her it's your choice to answer that, and she can only ask you." Her gaze slips down to the mug in her hands. "... She's... really interested in choices. What it means to make them, anyway."
It's scary. Shurui was like that, three years ago. It never lasted long; she learned very quickly that trust was a thing not meant to be given freely. And yet, in how many ways is she still like that? She *did* seem to sync with Kula well. She also does the same with actual children, for reasons she never fully understood until now. What does that say about her? About who she is? Was she created like Kula?
Man, at this rate, soon *she'll* need an aspirin.
K''s words provide a nice distraction for once, even if they provide no sort of advice. "Heh. I'm not looking to you for a solution. Advice, yeah. Answers, no." Setting down her mug, Shurui exits to the small bathroom. After the sound of rummaging through a cabinet of some sort, Shurui comes back in, walking over to casually offer a box of aspirin. Generic, of course, but at least it's extra strength.
"Here."
She still hasn't answered his question, for all her talking earlier.
No need to worry about K' going around getting high. K' doesn't like the stuff, can't afford to have his faculties impaired like that, and thus didn't touch any of it; he just had to suffer being around it. Unfortunately, he's not able to explain this to Shurui, as she doesn't ask; though her concerns about asking him are certainly warranted. He's not really in a mood for questioning, even if the answer is pretty simple to give.
"I don't have the time or patience to explain how shit works to some kid..." K' grumbles, palming his face and rubbing absently at a temple as Shurui explains Kula's mentality. He'd got that impression before: that she really -didn't- understand why anything about NESTS was wrong, why anything SHE did was wrong, or why he would want to leave. He can only assume that her incomprehension of his desire to cut and run means she's treated better than he ever was, and that-- coupled with the doting, extravagant full name she was given-- touches on his temper. Visibly, he gets angry... the same way he got angry, back when he thought NESTS wanted Shurui back a lot more than they did him.
"Whenever she bothers to ask, she'll be hearing that the only reason she's got such a spoilt life is cause NESTS figured out raising their weapons the way they raised me just bred traitors. But treating her better doesn't make any of the shit they do in the first place less wrong," asserts the boy who knowingly helps Southtown's King of Crime. "And it doesn't erase what they did to -me-."
Anger makes the pain worse. K''s eyes shut. "You might not be looking for a solution from me," he eventually says, his voice drifting damningly after her as she looks for some aspirin for him, "but I should have one. Without one, what kinda life will any of us have? The best I've got is killing NESTS from the top down." The quintessential 'head of the snake' sort of plan.
When the painkiller's proffered, K' takes it without opening his eyes. His ungloved hand brushes hers roughly. "...I think," he eventually starts, working open the bottle and pouring out a few of the pills, "I asked you a question." Uh oh, he was paying attention.
"Didn't say you had to teach her about life," Shurui retorts quickly. "I meant exactly what you *want* to tell her. She's gotta make her own decisions, even if it means remaining with NESTS. As for everything else, well. I pretty much *was* her three years ago. Just wasn't the sort of thing that was 'encouraged'. If I managed, she'll manage too. NESTS just delayed it." Of course, if it was up to Shurui, it wouldn't be the rude way she was 'introduced' to the world bad and good bits mixed together in a sticky bitter stew.
But it's not up to her. Reflecting on K''s riled mood, Shurui shakes her head. "Yeah, you're right. It doesn't change things. They'll keep ruining people's lives, or creating ones just to fuck up." Her lips turn into a thoughtful frown. "I'm the lucky one; I got thrown away. No one expected anything of me. I could decide my own value. It wasn't puppies and roses and sunshine or whatever, but I had freedom." She considers her words. "I still do. You deserve that too- fuck ups and all."
But first? Aspirin. Hearing K''s voice drift in behind her as she rummages through the trash, her hands slow audibly, her eyelids narrowing in thought. "..... Yeah. I hate thinking about it, but I know I got to. But right now, neither of us got ideas. Maybe, when they make their move, we'll get some. Other than that...." She trails off. ".... I dunno. All I know is I don't want to become you. I don't want to ever lose what I have. It took me three years to get here, and I don't want to lose it all. Maybe I'll get the nerve to kill for it."
She can't be nervous. It'll just make things worse, and really, it's not like she's alone. Be calm. Lose your shit later when you can take a shower and finish off what's left of that ice cream in the fridge while listening to your favorite record.
The ungloved hand roughly brushing hers to take the offered aspirin makes Shurui pause in her planning to hear K''s next words. Oh, heh. ".... Oh. I meant the things you run into that make your life more bittersweet instead of just bitter. The things that, whether you hate them or like them at the time, are things you'd never want to lose, sometimes to the point of making you selfish. Those sorts of things, I guess. Is that a good answer?"
A disgusted huff shows exactly what K' thinks of the decision 'remain with NESTS.' Capping the bottle again, a flick of his wrist arcs it right back towards the girl for her to catch. He says nothing to her assertion that it'll be Kula's choice, and that she'll probably manage it fine. He's talked repeatedly about choice and free will at Kula; but when it comes down to it, he's still controlling and dominant enough not to like it when people don't make the decisions HE thinks are right. It's the little hypocrisies like that which make him quite so endearing. ...or infuriating.
The rest of what she says next is all stuff he already knows. One of K''s lean shoulders lifts in a shrug, the movement a tacit acknowledgement of her words. His attention drifts a little, as he wets his throat with a drink-- clearing some of the roughness of the smoke away-- before tipping the pills back. They're the kind with the sickeningly sweet coating, and K' pauses, letting them linger in his mouth. The cloying sweetness almost reminds him of Kula, and for a moment his tired mind sidetracks. Maybe he's just too worried about it lately, but he can't get the girl off his mind. And she's not on in in any sort of pleasant way, either. Sighing a frustrated note, leaning back, he tips his head and-- with a little too much experience-- bolts the pills dry. They hurt going down, but he doesn't seem to care. It's guaranteed he had worse when he was a lab rat.
It's that one phrase Shurui says, though, that suddenly stands out from the rest and gets his attention. 'I don't want to become you.' The boy turns a slow eye on Shurui, his gaze narrowing slightly. Uh oh. "You talk like I didn't get anything I don't want to lose," he says, very lowly: almost warningly. "What I am now and what I've got isn't any less than what you have." He sounds defensive, as if he says it partially to reinforce it for himself: to reassure himself that that -is- the case. It took him long enough to believe for himself that he has some worth or value. He isn't going to stand for what identity he's got being questioned now... even if there are still some ways in which he still thinks he's nothing.
And his heightened, bristling mood persists through her next words. A nastily-knowing sort of smile pulls evanescently at the corner of his mouth, the slight curve reminiscent of the expression some particularly sadistic prophet might effect. "It's not a matter of 'maybe.' It's a matter of when. Cause I don't see any other way this can end. I already killed for my freedom more times than I could count on both our hands." NESTS assassins haven't left him alone too much since he ran away.
When Shurui finally answers his question, his attention drifts back. A moody cast settles back into his expression as he listens. Whip -is- something like that. The one piece of his past he was able to get back, with his own hands: under his own power. Something to be treasured; something he loves so much it hurts. "It's an answer I understand," he says neutrally, revealing very little of the real strength of his feelings on the matter. Absently rubbing his throat, he leaves it at that: taking another drink in lieu of words.
The box of aspirin lands against in the palm of Shurui's ready hand, flipping up in the air like a basketball that's soundly hit the rim before she snatches the hand upwards to reestablish her hold on it. Her face is still directed towards K', suddenly realizes the entire weight of her words.
"W-wait, I meant-!" Shurui's shoulders slump in a defeated poise. .... It was so much easier when she didn't feel the need to give a damn either way; now, she can't feel the need to let things be so blunt and unspecific. "I meant, I didn't wanna go through what you did with NESTS. Of course who you are isn't any less than me. Hell, I've got no clue why they're not hot on your heels instead of me. Sure I can see people's auras, but it's just a different way of doing what a lot of people do." Moving over to toss the box of aspirin onto the countertop, she adds, rather softly, "... Sorry."
Wasn't that the second time she's said that to him?
K''s next remark makes Shurui remain silent, but it's a thoughtful sort instead of some indirect form of protest. ".... Guess you're right on that." Going over to her futon, she sinks down on the edge of it, her gaze still looking downwards. "Maybe, when the time comes, I won't have to think about it. Just do it and move on." She turns her gaze on K'. ".... If you did it, I can do it. If I have to." Much like K' tried to convince himself at the same time he convinced Shurui, the Gedo girl's doing the same, though on the subject of killing than her own value.
The girl remains mute a few seconds more before the white-haired teen answers back on the issue of Whip, causing her to look up and then nod. "Good. Sometimes it's hard for me to put things into words."
Did she say it before? Maybe he didn't notice the first time. K' isn't too good at paying attention when other people are talking, after all. He's usually occupied in his own thoughts.
Dropping his gaze as Shurui hastens into a clarification, K' pins it to the ground and lifts one shoulder in a 'forget about it' shrug. She wonders why NESTS isn't going after him instead of her, and the phrase draws a little, humorless laugh out of the back of his throat. "They're close enough on MY heels too. Have been ever since I left. I'm not exempt." He inspects the back of his metal-gloved hand, slowly letting it open and shut: eyes resting on the source of most of his trouble. "I just never thought they felt me worth sending more than periodic assassins... up until I ran into the one they tailor-made just to fix my mistake for good. Guess being important isn't such a good feeling at all." A hollow chuckle.
He drops back into silence after that, already having said more than he usually cares to say to just about anybody. Perhaps he was only so forthright because he's in the company of one of the few people who'd understand. Having said his piece already on the topic of killing, he adds nothing more to what Shurui muses aloud. That's her cross to carry. He can't and won't do it for her.
A long few moments pass. It's anyone's guess whether it's uncomfortable for Shurui, but K' seems totally at home in the heavy silence. Eventually, as if rousing out of a reverie, he finally lifts his head-- like coming up for air-- and lets his yellow eyes rest back on hers. "...they didn't do anything other than talk? Didn't give you anything, did they? Ask you to do anything?"
".... Yeah," Shurui answers with a dry chuckle of her own. "It was easier when no one gave a damn about either of us, right? Except the people we didn't mind." Seeing the blazing form in the corner of her eye fiddle with that one dreaded hand, the short girl stands and steps over, bare feet quiet against the wooden floor. "Have you figuring out anything? About controlling your fire, that is."
Whatever words follow, Shurui eventually pads back to the futon, collapsing back against her pillow.
At first, the silence feels awkward, as if set apart from the usual sort that soaked into the apartment at any other hour. But then, after K' seems to not mind it or be annoyed by it, the grey-haired girl no longer feels the need to fill it up with words. The wind chimes by the window ring quietly as a night breeze passes through, cool against the face and hands.
".... Not really," the girl says at first, seeming to think it over. Then- oh wait. Milton. .... Should she tell him about Milton? It would be smart to, one part of her reasons. The other part clings to the child-like trust Kula placed in her. It's not that K' is *bad*, it's that he might be.... thorough. In his dealing of the problem.
Shurui's face saddens visibly, and she shifts in the futon, freeing her pocket to pull out a miniscule toy penguin, dangling on a chain. Kula may mean well, but Shurui can't count on someone like Angel setting it up just *so* Kula would give someone a bugged device. "Kula gave me it. If it *is* bugged, it probably wasn't by her. Do you have a way of checking it that *won't* destroy it? We should be able to scan it, or take it apart, or..." She sits up cross-legged, cupping the little penguin in her hand. "Okay, if you just want to crush it and be done with it, I'll find a way myself. I'll do it tomorrow. I'll find something."
K' holds his silence for a good, long while. He's mentally going over Geese's teachings. Howard had said that with focus, patience, calculation, and discipline would come the control and precision that K' so lacks... and he'd said that with control would come a greater strength: the snakelike strength of the Howard style, which waited for opponents to attack and then brutally punished their mistakes. K' believed that sort of razorlike control to be the key to command over his fire.
But in reality, he's just-- as usual-- overcomplicating the problem. If he would just have a little faith in his own ability, he could probably take the glove off now and be done with it. It's no longer anything more than a psychological crutch, and the only reason he still goes out of control when he takes it off is because he thinks he will. He needed it back when he was first 'created,' as the fire was too new and too powerful for him then; and that initial dependence, along with the scientists' dismissive assertions that-- failure as he was-- he would ALWAYS need it, has put it firmly in his mind that he's deficient and has to do something extraordinary before the flames will obey him.
He toys with the clasps a little bit, but fear holds him back from opening them. He doesn't deserve the fire, stolen and foreign as it is, and he's built inadequately to control it: those thoughts are what lets the fire run wild even when he does try to take his glove off. "I've been trying," he eventually says, very slowly and very cryptically. "Think I might need to find somebody who knows more than I do. Or I might just need... to get my defect corrected."
He doesn't seem eager to dwell on the topic, not really wanting to discuss Geese. The penguin is therefore a welcome distraction. His head lifts instantly, yellow eyes narrowing on the tiny keychain as Shurui explains its origin. The innocuous penguin is miniscule, no bigger than an inch; but the way K' eyes it, it might as well be a nuke.
He's up in an instant, stalking closer, and he doesn't look like he's got it in his mind to consider sentimentality in his methods of dealing with this potential threat. Leaning over once he comes to a stop next to the futon, he reaches to roughly pick the hapless little avian right out of her hand: no doubt, to subject poor Milton to his unimpressed inspection and considerably... less gentle handling. "I'll look at it," he says shortly, his tone brooking no disagreement. "Relax, I'm not gonna break it." Yet.
"Nn." Shurui makes a thoughtful sound as she scoots on her futon towards K', dark eyes directed towards the glove. "Maybe," she muses aloud. "Someone who specializes in handling chi? Or has a lot of experien- don't talk like that!" Words turn clipped at sharp at K''s words, followed by the vague gaze as the girl does her best to make some semblance of eye contact. "You said it yourself- 'what I am now and what I've got isn't any less than what you have.' If you want to control your powers, thinking of them as defects isn't going to make things any easier." She goes quiet then, eyes falling down towards the blurry hand, overlaid in her eyes with the holy flame beating within. "We should try some ways to get it under control, when it gets quieter. Maybe, with your sister around, that might make it easier?" Her face squints up skeptically. "I wish I could do more than *see* the stuff; even if I tell you what I see, it's not gonna do any good unless you can react to it quickly." She finally ends her wayward train of thought with a shrug, remaining silent on the matter, probably to K''s relief.
Frowning as the helpless penguin is snatched roughly from her hand, Shurui says, "Don't even think about it." Her voice comes out deadpan. "Or I'll make you find an exact replica. And *you'll* have to buy it. With your own money." But how to make it so he'll find some benefit to it? Something that'd make him take ten minutes to take something slow instead of one minute to give up and smash the damn thing. It can't be worth more than pocket change after all... Mayhaps *she* should put something on the line. Something.... a little more expensive. Time *is* money, after all. "If you manage to find out either way, and it looks just the same as when I gave it to you, I'll..." She thinks. "..... I'll pay you. I'll pay you the price of.... a box of cigarettes. The good ones, not the cheap kind. The kind you smoked before you came here." It sets her on edge. MONEY FOR LUXUARY GOODS INSTEAD OF CHEAP KNOCKOFFS. AUGH. that money could be going to some meat on sale or something and- .... then again, the smell of these ones isn't as noxious as the cheap ones that stain the air long after they've been spent. "I'll give you the money and you can spend it on one of those. Or whatever else. You can take it apart, you can scan it, you can do whatever. But don't destroy M- the peng... the keychain."
A fatalistic shrug is all Shurui really gets for her pains. "They always told me they got me wrong. That's why I couldn't handle the fire." His eyes drift closed. "Now, they fixed the problem with Kula. I don't know what else you can call a fuckup that you fix, if not a 'defect.'" And that, K' seems to think, is that.
But he won't -leave- it at that. "I'll find my own way to fix it," he continues, rather stubbornly, one eye cracking open so he can settle a baleful stare on Shurui. "If you want to help, well, your prerogative how you want to waste your time." A sardonic, rather... -annoying- grin.
Why has he turned so self-deprecating, after what seemed like a good bit of self-esteem progress earlier? It's fairly simple, if slightly contradictory. K' might think he's come pretty far-- that he's scraped together a halfway decent life he really doesn't want to lose-- but he still doesn't think too highly of himself. He knows he's got some worth, some strength; but he still thinks he's fallen pretty short of what he was supposed to be-- and what he could have been.
He could dwell on that for ages, letting himself mire in a melancholy, brooding mood; instead, the appearance of the penguin distracts him, spurring him to suspiciously pluck the tiny thing up and let it roll sadly into the palm of his left hand. He looks it over critically, checking for seams and testing the weight, and as he does so he shrugs a response at all Shurui's nervous attempts to bribe him for poor Milton's safety. "Dunno why you care so much," he complains. "It's just a fuckin keychain. Anyway, I doubt they'd care enough to bug it or whatever, they know where you are already... probably already got a plan. What more information do they really need?" But even despite this logic, K' still doesn't look like he trusts the thing; he looks like he might just crush it anyway, just to be on the safe side.
Shurui's last, more specific bribe distracts him, however. He looks up, a brow lifting, and pauses a moment as if to process. Then he just laughs-- a little meanly, it has to be admitted-- flipping his hand over in a deft movement and dangling the poor hapless penguin by its chain. "You wanna pay me the price of the kind of cigarettes I was smoking just now? You even -got- that much money?"
"And what makes you think they're not just telling her overwise?" Shurui leans back against the wall. "I'm not saying it's all in your head- but telling someone they're perfect and telling someone else they're defected and you're gonna get two different people. K', I felt her hand. It was cold. She was practically begging her caretaker for gloves by the time they'd left. Because her hands were cold. It was a spring day. I don't think it's a matter of her being 'fixed'." The baleful, wry grin is met with the girl's awkward stare- that sort that is just enough off to make it unsettling. Maybe, even annoying. She leans forward. "I'll do it because I want to. And a simple 'no'll do, you know. If I ever ask you."
"I got my reasons," the girl says to K''s accusation, her voice sulky. "And it's a fucking keychain, yeah. But you asked. I could have lied to you, you know." As for how much money she has? Shurui huffs and rolls her eyes. "Not enough to buy you ten packs, no. How much was one pack of those anyway? It's not like they're made of gold or whatever." Wait, no. They *are* made of gold. Tobacco gold, that is. "I have *some* money. I just hate spending it on things I don't need, or overspending when I can get by with something else. Okay?" She makes an attempt to level her eyes with his, and, when she's off the mark, simply folds her arms and makes another audible grunt of annoyance. "You want a pack of smokes or not?"
A sulk sets into K''s expression as Shurui coolly answers most of his nettling, the wind a little taken out of his sails by her replies. It's hard to annoy someone when they just counter your teasing with logic, and on top of that it takes the fun out of it; as such, K' kind of loses the mood. Irritated, he settles back on his heels. "...Doubt they told her she was entirely perfect," is all he eventually comes up with. "Probably told her she won't ever be 'good' until she's done her job and I'm dead."
The 'simple no' comment? He heard it, but it's a toss-up whether he'll actually listen to her. Asking K' to be polite is a losing battle; as Maxima's already discovered, long ago.
And then, the girl persists in trying to pay him not to hurt Milton. Somewhere between confused and annoyed now, he just shrugs at her insistence. "Che..." Lip lifting a little in scorn, baring a glint of a canine, K' retreats back to his windowsill and flicks the keychain up: shutting his hand around the helpless penguin as it smacks facefirst into his palm. Poor Milton. "Don't bother. I got them free, could probably get more the same way. Don't know how much they cost per box, probably between ten or twenty... nothing I think you'd care to drop lightly."
Especially not on K''s lung cancer. The boy settles back on the sill, looking a little restless now, like he probably wants to leave soon. Noticing the derelict water bottle, he picks it up, tilting it back to finish it in one impatient go; his bared throat, exposed when his head tips back, shows as much scarring as it does smooth skin. "I can get it scanned," he eventually shoots at her afterwards, as he leans back forward heavily: a long sigh mingling with his words. Elbows dropped on his knees, lean form slumped, he regards the empty bottle morosely a moment, before he flicks a wrist and spins it neatly across the room into the trash. "You'd get it back by tomorrow... or the day after..."
Logical and argumentive, sometimes to a fault. That's Shurui. When someone gets her riled up enough, anyway. And K' does that, even if it's not in the fashion he tried for. He annoys her with his hypocritical view on himself and how he deals with the world, but he's a source of comfort when he could have easily ignored her that day she came into the YFCC. It wasn't as if she came solely for him that day, after all.
".... And then they'll probably toss her away for something more shiny. With luck, she'll end up like me, if they decide to make a mistake like that again." Nothing like finding the toys you discarded in the hands of a person you hate. Shurui doubts a case like hers won't happen for a long while.
".... Thanks." Shurui looks at the apathatic shoulders of K', going silent. "I wouldn't be dropping it lightly if I did," she then adds, her mouth twisting those words around awkwardly. "When I decide to do something for someone else... that's when money's different." Then, throwing her her hands up, she smirks, eyes closed. "But, if you're going to do it for free, I won't question it. I can easily use that money for a good steak!" ........ Not that she would. Non-fatty good steaks mean spending more!
Like expensive cigarettes, which K' somehow obtained free of charge. No one gets free cigarettes. Not ones like that anyway. Most, if not all, vices are free unless they want something from you. Like a favor, the temptation to stay and empty out your checkbook a little further, a silent favor for a load of jobs well done and a toast to future success. A ploy to soften your judgment and let free information. It all depends. Shurui suspects all but the last one; K''s too careful.
".... You get them free? At the same place you got the smell of marijuana on you?" The girl's nose twitches at the mention, even though it has long since gotten used to K''s presence. ".... You better not be getting yourself into something you can't handle." The unsaid words inbetween the lines: if you disappear, she'll worry.
Whether or not K' has an answer for this, Shurui allows the silence to build again before having her answer, delivered with a sigh and sagging shoulders. "If you get into trouble, I'll come after you," she finally threatens. "That'd piss you off, right?"
K' already has another of those cigarettes halfway to his mouth when Shurui suddenly starts questioning where they came from. Mumbling a mental curse, he wordlessly sticks it in his lips in lieu of responding, and considers the situation in silence a moment. He said too much and now she's got suspicious. The incriminating cigarette bobs a little as he mouths it absently, the unconscious nervous movement only seeming to incriminate him further.
It soon stills once K' realizes it's taking place. His yellow eyes narrow infinitesimally, and his expression soon smoothes over into blankness.
"I know what I'm doing," he eventually settles for saying. And he says nothing more, his abrupt silence afterwards slamming the door on any further questioning she might try. But then she threatens to come after him if he gets in trouble, and he lets a dry chuckle slip past the unlit cigarette once she asks whether it'd piss him off. "Guess you got me pegged..." is his sole answer to that question, a sardonic smile settling comfortably on his face, as he stands up and one-handedly throws open her window and screen as far as they'll go.
In one agile movement he slides right out her window, coiling to fit his tall figure through the frame properly and uncurling back to full height once he's perched on the sill outside. Balancing there an instant, he throws a cocky sort of smirk over his shoulder. "Lucky for you I don't plan to get in trouble," he finishes, his smirk widening: and then he slips deftly off, landing lightly and with barely a sound, melting back into the night just as quickly as he came.
"You know what you're doing," Shurui parrots, with little belief present in her voice. "What do you mean by 'doi- hey!" The surprised look on her face may perhaps be a satisfying prize for the stunt about to follow for K', Shurui's stunned look the last thing he sees before dropping into blessed silence and darkness. And, for a few steps, it stays that way, except-
Ka-dunk.
Whether K' is deft enough to catch the cool bottle in mid-flight to his head, or side-step it so it hits the ground, either way a bottle of water comes sailing across the horizon with rather nice accuracy, considering Shurui's no baseball player. Her eyesight when it comes to people and living creatures? Top notch. There were reasons she was always put on watch duty when she was on the streets.
The other reason? She severely sucked at stealing, for obvious reasons.
"I see you out there asshole. Get home and get some sleep!" *slam* The window and screen are closed, for full dramatic effect, with the curtains drawn. Eventually, another light or two goes on in the other dorms, a few random faces peering out to wonder what the commotion was about, They, of course, will not see a thing.
At least it's another bottle of water. And the top has been slightly twisted.
Log created on 20:35:21 05/26/2008 by K', and last modified on 04:37:15 05/29/2008.